Stories for January 2018

Punta Arenas celebrated Rhubarb Day as part of the Magallanes Expo celebrations. Although not original from the extreme south of Chile, rhubarb has long grown and adapted in Magallanes region where it is much valued for its gastronomic and medicinal properties.

The government of Argentine president Mauricio Macri is expected to announce on Monday as part of the overall austerity and adjustment programs, a freeze on all top government salaries and the reduction of at least 20% in political nominee posts in the Executive branch.

The unique Royal Mail Ship, RMS St Helena, will depart on a final voyage (268) from the remote South Atlantic island of St. Helena on Saturday, 10 February, having dutifully served for the past 27 years. The island, a UK Overseas Territory located 1200 miles off the west coast of Africa could only be reached by the ocean-going passenger-cargo ship service, until commercial flights began operating last October, following completion of an airport.

At least 14 people were killed in a shootout at a nightclub in Fortaleza, in northeastern Brazil, officials said on Saturday. We can confirm 14 deaths, Andre Costa, security secretary for the state of Ceara - of which Fortaleza is the capital - told a press conference.

The UK is heading towards a dilution of Brexit, former cabinet minister Theresa Villiers has said. The Conservative MP, writing in the Sunday Telegraph said there was a real danger the UK will sign up to an agreement with Brussels which could keep us in the EU in all but name. Her comments come amid growing Tory party rifts over Brexit.

Scientists have shown through direct satellite observations of the ozone hole that levels of ozone-destroying chlorine are declining. Measurements show that the decline in chlorine, resulting from an international ban on chlorine-containing man-made chemicals called chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs), has resulted in about 20% less ozone depletion during the Antarctic winter than there was in 2005, the first year that measurements of chlorine and ozone during the Antarctic winter were made by NASA's Aura satellite.

Punta Arenas. Chile seems determined to remain as the main calling point for Antarctica scientific and logistics support. This month two private undertakings were inaugurated which confirmed that determination, one of them is the DAP's MV Betanzos a scientific vessel for Antarctica research, and the second in the Antarctic Warrior, belonging to the Petromar company and which has been conditioned to transport supplies and fuel to Antarctica.

At least seven police officers were killed and 41 others wounded on Saturday when alleged drug traffickers detonated a bomb at a station in the Colombian city of Barranquilla. The attack comes as President Juan Manuel Santos seeks to end the armed conflict that has wracked Colombia for 50 years. Much of the violence has been linked to drug trafficking.

President Trump declared America “open for business” in a speech on Friday to global to political and business elites in Davos, Switzerland, while taking a hard line on trade and vowing to make commerce with other countries “fair and reciprocal.”